Oho boy. Yesterday was the day of epic fail. I didn't haul my ass out of bed til after 5pm so I haven't managed to pick up the pretty new platform shoes that the postman has put aside for me. Also, when I got to the Co-op they'd run out of blueberry muffins. "You ARE the fail," my housemate told me.
You may as well know that I've applied for two 'Career'-esque jobs. I mean full time and everything. One is promoting live comedy *, the other is an Editorial Assistant thing. You know, these and other jobs I've been looking at in the Smoke - they are all things I could easily enough have got if I'd applied say a year after I graduated. But as it stands I now have the last five years to explain.
Vindice: Paralysed by fear.
Interviewer: Paralysed?
Vindice: Yes.
Interviewer: By fear?
Vindice: ...yes.
Interviewer: ...for five years?
Vindice: ...uh, yeah.
Interviewer: So...you're over it now?
Vindice: Um...yes?
Interviewer: So, you want to move to London, and for us to entrust you with a permanent job of some responsibility?
Vindice: ...um...ye-es?
* a ruse to meet Dave Gorman.
Anyway, I've come to the conclusion that where I'm working is Social Services. Friends were asking me what my current workplace was, and because what the agency had told me before I got there didn't really match up with the reality, I was saying, "well, it seems to be a bit like Social Services...it might actually...be?"
They're very laid-back there, they don't mind at all that I normally rock up between 30 and 60 minutes later than I'm due. Last week two managers came into the office to stare at me in awe because I knew how to create a graph in Excel. And the woman I work with, Alex, is stellar. Her heart's elsewhere, too; she wants to be a counsellor. She sees three or four clients a week, and what do you know, it's at the very same therapy centre where I did my hypnotherapy training. It's funny how we'll be talking about something and - well, for example last Wednesday:
"I really don't feel as though the week's got started yet."
Alex said, "How would you know if the week had got started?"
"That's a bit of a therapeutic question. Like, 'How would you know if your life was Productive?' "
"Hm. Yes. Sorry."
So, I've just lost a lot of confidence in the last five years, that's all. But once you have lost your confidence, it's more difficult than saying, 'that's all it is' to get it back. I mean it's not like you'd have said I was particular self-assured if you'd met me when I was 18. I hadn't a clue how to conduct myself in a social situation. But I believed I was some kind of prodigious writer and could turn my hand to any given literary task. And when I was coming to the end of my degree studies and started telling people I wanted to go into Arts promotion, folk would say, "oh, that's competitive," and I'd say, "yeah, but unlike the majority of the competition I'm good." These days re-ordering the files is about all I'm good for.
I'd been talking about the pursuit of happiness, and Alex said, "but you know something I saw yesterday. I was walking home and you know how windy it was. I saw a gull stretched out on the wind; it was obviously having quite a tough time. But the sun was setting and it caught the underside of this gull, so the whole underneath was just lit up gold. It was amazing to see. I suppose that, itself, is happiness, isn't it? Just a moment when you see something that...gives you joy, I suppose."
Anyway, I hope that you've all had nice weekends and found pretty things. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to the pub.
You may as well know that I've applied for two 'Career'-esque jobs. I mean full time and everything. One is promoting live comedy *, the other is an Editorial Assistant thing. You know, these and other jobs I've been looking at in the Smoke - they are all things I could easily enough have got if I'd applied say a year after I graduated. But as it stands I now have the last five years to explain.
Vindice: Paralysed by fear.
Interviewer: Paralysed?
Vindice: Yes.
Interviewer: By fear?
Vindice: ...yes.
Interviewer: ...for five years?
Vindice: ...uh, yeah.
Interviewer: So...you're over it now?
Vindice: Um...yes?
Interviewer: So, you want to move to London, and for us to entrust you with a permanent job of some responsibility?
Vindice: ...um...ye-es?
* a ruse to meet Dave Gorman.
Anyway, I've come to the conclusion that where I'm working is Social Services. Friends were asking me what my current workplace was, and because what the agency had told me before I got there didn't really match up with the reality, I was saying, "well, it seems to be a bit like Social Services...it might actually...be?"
They're very laid-back there, they don't mind at all that I normally rock up between 30 and 60 minutes later than I'm due. Last week two managers came into the office to stare at me in awe because I knew how to create a graph in Excel. And the woman I work with, Alex, is stellar. Her heart's elsewhere, too; she wants to be a counsellor. She sees three or four clients a week, and what do you know, it's at the very same therapy centre where I did my hypnotherapy training. It's funny how we'll be talking about something and - well, for example last Wednesday:
"I really don't feel as though the week's got started yet."
Alex said, "How would you know if the week had got started?"
"That's a bit of a therapeutic question. Like, 'How would you know if your life was Productive?' "
"Hm. Yes. Sorry."
So, I've just lost a lot of confidence in the last five years, that's all. But once you have lost your confidence, it's more difficult than saying, 'that's all it is' to get it back. I mean it's not like you'd have said I was particular self-assured if you'd met me when I was 18. I hadn't a clue how to conduct myself in a social situation. But I believed I was some kind of prodigious writer and could turn my hand to any given literary task. And when I was coming to the end of my degree studies and started telling people I wanted to go into Arts promotion, folk would say, "oh, that's competitive," and I'd say, "yeah, but unlike the majority of the competition I'm good." These days re-ordering the files is about all I'm good for.
I'd been talking about the pursuit of happiness, and Alex said, "but you know something I saw yesterday. I was walking home and you know how windy it was. I saw a gull stretched out on the wind; it was obviously having quite a tough time. But the sun was setting and it caught the underside of this gull, so the whole underneath was just lit up gold. It was amazing to see. I suppose that, itself, is happiness, isn't it? Just a moment when you see something that...gives you joy, I suppose."
Anyway, I hope that you've all had nice weekends and found pretty things. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to the pub.
VIEW 9 of 9 COMMENTS
you could have to explain why you wanted to go to university after spending nearly 7 years working in a comic shop. although you'd think that's fairly self-explanatory...